NASA and ESA Celebrate 10 Years Since Titan Landing
The hardy probe not only survived the descent and landing, but continued to transmit data for more than an hour on the frigid surface of Titan, until its batteries were drained.
Since that historic moment, scientists from around the world have pored over volumes of data about Titan, sent to Earth by Huygens -- a project of the European Space Agency -- and its mothership, NASA's Cassini spacecraft. In the past 10 years, data from the dynamic spacecraft duo have revealed many details of a surprisingly Earth-like world.
In addition to the technical wizardry needed to pull off this tour de force,
international partnerships were critical to successfully delivering the two
spacecraft to Saturn and Titan.
"A mission of this ambitious scale represents a triumph in international
collaboration,” said Earl Maize, Cassini Project manager at NASA's Jet
Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
"From the mission's formal beginning in 1982, to Huygens' spectacular landing
23 years later, to the present day, Cassini-Huygens owes much of its success to
the tremendous synergy and cooperation between more than a dozen countries. This
teamwork is still a major strength of the project as the Cassini orbiter
continues to explore the Saturn system," Maize said.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.